Week 16: Could YOU run one?

Dec 7 & 9 · M8. The Capstone Showcase: every team pitches, split across both sessions.

This week’s big question

Could YOU run one, and can you convince a room it should exist? This is the graded Capstone Showcase: the live pitch of your team’s viable new nonprofit (about seven minutes, then questions). No exam, and no new material this week. Every team pitches once, on Monday or on Wednesday. Module 8 · builds LO1 & LO6 (full vocabulary), LO7 (connect to current events) · thread: both.

Note: there is no finals-week meeting. The term’s last class is Wed Dec 9, and the written plan and peer evaluations are due Sun Dec 13. Nothing is scheduled during Dec 14–18.

Readings

None. This week is your work, not new reading. The Module 8 reading was assigned in Week 15; bring what you took from it into the pitch.

Session 1 · Mon Dec 7: Peer review, then the first pitches (TBD)

We open with a 20-minute peer review of the B3 drafts. Your team passes its plan to the next team in the posted pitch order (the last team passes to the first). Each of you reads the sections that match the ones you wrote for your own plan, and your team records three checks on sheet 1:

  1. Say it back: one of you states the plan in four parts: who has the need, what the nonprofit does, what should change for those people, and why a nonprofit rather than a business or government. Does each section you read serve those same people and that change? Where did the plan lose you?
  2. The chain, as in Week 6: take the plan’s main activity and open the source it cites (legal name, EIN for a U.S. organization, page or section). Does the source show the practice? Does the plan say what it adapts and why that should produce the intended change? Is the outcome a change, not a count? Is an assumption named to test?
  3. The fix: what one change would most strengthen this plan by Sunday? Give the page.

Three ticks from the B5 rubric complete your review: two teammates’ site-visit organizations cited, with who supplied each; each funding share citing a verified comparable’s line, with what the startup keeps or changes, and why; and AI-appendix entries that name the organization, quote the AI claim, and cite the 990 line. Then the sheet goes back to the plan’s owners, who write the fix they will make, or why they disagree. Reviewers photograph the sheet before handing it back; owners photograph it before handing it in. Sheet 1 is Monday’s in-class work and is collected; it feeds the owners’ B5 revision.

Then Monday’s teams pitch, in the posted order: about seven minutes each, then about three minutes of questions. The team that reviewed your plan asks first, from its photo of the sheet; then anyone may ask. One question to try: tell the team how this need is met where you grew up, and ask why Bloomington needs a nonprofit for it. When you pitch, keep your plan open so you can answer from your sources, and note the questions you get for B5.

Bring your B3 draft in a form the next team can read: printed, or a file you can share on the spot.

Session 2 · Wed Dec 9: The remaining pitches + course close (TBD)

The remaining teams pitch in the posted order: about seven minutes each, then about three minutes of questions, the reviewing team first.

Then we close the course. On sheet 1, on your own, answer:

  1. One organization: pick one you studied this term (your site-visit organization, a comparable from your plan, or a case from class). What does it do, and for whom?
  2. One idea: which course idea best explains why it exists or how it works? Give one piece of evidence: a filing line, a reading page, or something you saw.
  3. Could you run one? Name the first thing you would need to learn or test before starting one like it, here or where you grew up. If a new nonprofit is not the right route, say what is (a program inside an existing nonprofit, a business, or government) and why.

While you write, the screen lists ideas from each week to draw on. After six minutes, compare answers with a neighbour; then I invite a few volunteers to read theirs. Sheet 1 is Wednesday’s in-class work and is collected. We finish with a one-line check-in from each team: who revises which section of B5 by Sunday.

What’s due / prep

  • Rail B · B3, Assembled draft (10 pts, credit): uploaded Sun Dec 6, every section in one document, whole enough to be read straight through; it is the plan the next team reviews on Monday.
  • Rail B · B4, Capstone Pitch (10 pts, rubric): about seven minutes, each of you presenting the section you wrote. Your team’s day and place in the pitch order are posted on this page and announced in class the week before. If you use slides, have them ready to open before class starts on your day. Where possible, local nonprofit staff join as a friendly audience and may ask questions.
  • The showcase happens once. Miss your day and B4 scores 0 for you, and the session counts as an absence: no rescheduled slot, no recorded substitute. The only exceptions are a documented AES accommodation or religious observance arranged in advance; see Policies.
  • Rail B · B5, Final plan + AI-process appendix + peer evaluations (15 pts, rubric), due Sun Dec 13, after you pitch, so you can fold in the peer review and the questions you got. Each of you submits a confidential peer evaluation. Peer evaluations and the plan’s authorship map can move your score away from the team’s. See Startup Plan & Pitch and AI Process Log.

Looking ahead